Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Everything in this world is related. Art relates to other forms of art and various art forms relate to other parallels in the form to create a cohesive form of art.

City building or city making is an art in itself and it needs constant efforts and imagination of the city building artists??to dwell on the large canvas they have. With the limitations of the natural features, rules and regulations, bureaucracy, they have to ‘create’ a city which is piece of art. This piece of art goes through a constant phase of changes in its intricate patterns and textures. One can consider a city made up of more complex and much more obscure components, which marks basic components of the fuller city mosaic. On a more poetic thought, what if we consider each and every city as a perfect example of painting. A moving painting perhaps?

I have been intrigued by this perpetual imagination that every city when visualized by an eye from a larger aerial distance could actually look like a moving painting. When cities looked from an aero plane make a distinct pattern and texture relating it with a work of art in itself. These thoughts concretize more when one views the city from a higher moving object like the aero plane.

On an unusual thought – what if we look at cities from unique art perspective. Leave apart from the theories which state that city building is an art in itself. What can make as a curious case is that leave apart the basic structure of a city viz; major roads, infrastructural fundamentals like bridges, natural features like mountains that can form a extensive sketch out of the ‘painting’ while in the additional elements like buildings and other sub layers form the derived essentials. Whereas the moveable’s like people, cars etc can be the finer tones of one large canvas of work of art.

If we consider each person as one pixel in the large print of the city, their choreography of movement patterns, their intermingling destinations could become an integral part of a moving city mosaic.

To add to the rhythm is the eclectic play of the seasons where the almighty bestows us with the real marvels of his vivid imagination. Once we have a colourful blend of the rainbows, rains painting the city green, flowers, beautiful insects, and beautiful living beings. All such visually stimulating features add charm to the city image.

Some enchanting cities like Venice, Amsterdam can present an beguiling painting with the presence of water…a ‘water’-colour effect perhaps? Such places are ruled by the character of water, thereby giving it a guideline of sorts. Thus we have city of canals, or city of rivers or city of mountains etc.Some other European destinations which boast of a colourful mix of culture can represent an exclusive form of city painting.

Cities built on hills have a different kind of creative forces which govern them as the terrain is the natural indicator giving them the required principle. Such ‘paintings’ can be naturally colourful with the added incentive of a wonderful weather.

No matter the location of the cities, derivatives , intricacies and the pattern it represents, one thing is for sure is that there are no words to describe the creative force driving these wonderful city palettes. The outpouring of creativity surges from the depths of the artists and floods the canvas, time to time. The dynamism never dries up, it remains as an inaccessible mystery, capable of calling forth the deepest of obscurity to help change the nature of the way it occurs at any given moment. There by, the city creates, fashions and models a subjective, stimulating and thought provoking work of art.

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Human being – the one animal which god bestowed upon the ability to ‘think’ as in comparison to other ‘animals’. This ‘thinking’ when used as a positive connotation leads us humans to great extents in each facet of life. But when ‘this thinking’ goes on an unconstructive trait leads us humans to murky facets of human survival.

These various facets of human existence are certainly evident in many great achievements and manmade catastrophes in the world. World wars, nuclear bombing, wars both at an international level and national level is one side of the human persona. Love, like, warmth, care forms another aspect. Respect, reverence, admiration, worship can be named as the third. Anger, hatred, jealousy somehow gets imbibed in the human minds leading to some disgraceful actions. These various facets of human nature can be seen in the day to day life depending on the circumstances a person is subjected to.

What interests me though is the fact that this ‘mind’ sets apart all human beings. Brain functions for more of the rational decisions we take in day-to-day life, but the experiences we face in the routine life linked with emotions are stored in human body in a place called as ‘mind’. The nurturing and conditioning of this mind forces the body to function in a certain manner. Unfulfilled aspirations, unattainable relations, unachievable desires can make the mind an unkempt place. But on the other hand successes for the efforts, directed energy, learning from each experience can nutrition the mind to ‘behave’ in an appropriate manner.

Where one can see the human minds going great depths to attain love, gratitude in life, there is an evil side of the human psyche too on display. The so called ‘grey shades’ of human mind. As universally accepted fact that the constructive mind when applied in a productive way can leap in bounds for the human being ,destructive mind can lead us to a path where only hell prevails.

A case example to establish this relation between the true cause of the ‘mindful’ or ‘mindless’ behavior was when I could see both the sides of human psyche in one of the more revered festivals for the Hindus. The much scared act of worshipping the almighty can display a variant of human mentality. The act is same, to worship the lord, but there are several ways to ‘display’ their affection. One can see worshiping the lord being practiced as a business venture: thus commercializing the ‘sacred act’. Putting on exorbitant prices on puja, unnecessarily charging for doing some basic things in ‘sacred places’ have become the order of the day. We are nothing but falling in the traps of these fraudulent menaces. To add to the agony are the unruly fights which happen on streets during procession, in scared places like temples, thus questioning the ‘sacred act’ of worship in totality.

I was utterly shocked and shaken to witness the many rowdy shades of the human mind unfolding in front of me when I happened to attend this year’s Ganesh festival procession. On one hand was the ritual of the procession being followed where thousands of devotees throng such places who are drunk. The sacred act of immersing the ganesh idol is accompanied by these unwanted elements. How on earth can one allow such dirty rudiments? To add to the fury is the havoc they create in such crowded areas when they lose control of their senses. Unnecessarily belting someone inhumanely, unsettling the crowd, eve-teasing women are some of the ‘regulars’ on such an arena. Many people have lost faith in the divinity of the public procession due to these cheapos.

Briefly an analysis ran in my mind after being an onlooker for the procession which was - Human beings though are conferred with the ‘uniquely different’ biological features , differ from each other in terms of individual actions all because of the mind, the emotional baggage that they carry with them.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Life makes us come across people from various sects of the the social order. Majority of them form the people in the places where we grow, places we live, places we learn and places where we work. My workplace is such a place where I come across an eclectic mix of all the classes of people.

Right from the security guard,security incharge, office boys, house cleaning staff people from various departments, my colleagues, my bosses form a strong network of people around me for 9 hours of the day. Other than work, I enjoy observing the typical personality traits of all people around me.

With the accustomed and cheerful good morning wishes of the security guard to customary smiles of the house cleaning staff, to the ‘professional’ approach of fellow counterparts to the friendly yet demanding natures of the seniors, I take pleasure in being a quiet spectator to them.

But there are two distinctly different faction of people that ‘attracts’ me to observe. From the curious and anxious eyes of the villagers and farmers to the sparkle in the corporates, my office space sees it all. Amongst all the people who visit our office, my eyes stabilizes mostly on two interesting cases of habituals - The farmers/ villagers who are regulars to my office and the consultants/ clients who frequent our premises. Ours being a real estate development company, it deals with the land issues of the farmers and villagers, thus directing them to come over to our organization for negotiations. It is always amusing to ‘read’ these village dwellers from their body language and nature of their talks. It is an excellent example to be a eyewitness to the people from all walks of life walking in and out of the ‘office space’.

Really brilliant is to ‘listen unknowingly’ to the issues of the farmers and the villagers who wait for their turn to meet the concerned official. The anxiety of getting a good deal for their lands, reaping in huge returns or meager dividends are the thoughts running in their minds which are evident in their naïve eyes. A good deal that can help them fulfill their dreams, can get them money to get a better lifestyle, to sacrifice the piece of land they have taken care of as a baby of their own. Somewhere I can see a sense of emotional attachment to the soil they have grown up, but also knowing that this forgo can make their lives even better.

On the contrary, I distantly come across these adamant negotiators who stand firmly refusing to part with their land thus posing threat to the holistic development of the city.

Interesting to see is the attire of ‘these traditional sons of soils’ as I call them which adds grace to their personality. It is lovely to see that they are proud of their traditional elements of dressing like the turbans, nav-vari saris (time-honored marathi sari) and the extravagant yet simplistic jewellery.

On the other hand are the consultants and the clients who carry with them the confidence, exuberance and the gait which is noticeable. Most of them have a ‘unique style of their own- just like the other one’. But one can not miss them certainly especially in the crowd when their dressing and fashionable accessories. Moreover their loud smells will make u catch the attention of your nose buds. Such piercing is the smell of their deodorants and perfumes that you can ‘smell’ them from a distance – I think of this as a wake up call,perhaps! With the restricted and calculated body moves, they form the ‘professional’ segment of the society.

Nevertheless, my place of work proves to be an excellent platform to observe, ‘study’ and analyze fascinating assortment of the human species which are ‘similar yet different’.